On the go and no time to finish that story right now? Your News is the place for you to save content to read later from any device. Register with us and content you save will appear here so you can access them to read later.

The company said it had significantly repaired the rental before giving it to Harper, but that once her tenancy ended, they found a stained glass window removed from an inside door and the walls contaminated with meth.

Fronting the Tenancy Tribunal in a separate hearing, fellow Christchurch tenant Minna O'Toole was also ordered to pay $13,241 to her landlord Holmwood Real Estate.

The company told the hearing O'Toole or others had smoked meth in the rental, leading to it spending more than $12,000 on meth testing and cleaning costs.

It said there were clear signs O'Toole had been taking drugs in the rental during the last six months of her tenancy.

"The tenant's behaviour changed. She became irrational and appeared cut off. Her eyes rolled in her head and she could not maintain eye contact," the landlord told the tribunal.

"While she had previously kept the premises reasonably clean and tidy, it became filthy.

There were little bags containing marijuana and butane bottles in the premises."

Meth testing also showed the rental exceeded contamination levels of 15 µg/100cm² currently used as a guideline after being backed by the former Chief Scientific Advisor to the Prime Minister Sir Peter Gluckman.

"In the circumstances, I accept that the proposed decontamination is necessary toget the premises to a reasonably clean and tidy state," the adjudicator wrote.